Sleepless Night
by TheBreakfastGenie
Summary: "You seem tired this morning, you okay?" "Well, you know, Cas doesn't actually sleep." Sam wants to know why Dean is so tired on a case, so Dean recounts one of the challenges of living with an angel of the Lord. Destiel!


"Dean. _Dean_," a voice said insistently from somewhere to his right. The voice was Sammy's, or at least he thought so. "_Dean!_" the voice—yes, it was definitely Sam—persisted.

"Huh, what, I'm awake," Dean practically shouted, his head shooting up from where it had been resting on the Impala's steering wheel.

Sam looked at him skeptically.

"Well, it's a good thing I brought coffee." Right, breakfast. Sam had gone into a store to pick up breakfast. Dean knew that. "Are you sure you're okay to drive?"

"After the coffee I will be," Dean promised hastily. Sam was the only other person on the planet allowed to drive his baby, but Dean still preferred to do it himself most of the time.

"You seem tired this morning," Same commented innocently. "You okay?"

Dean lowered the coffee cup he was in the process of draining in order to shoot his brother a dirty look.

"Well, you know, Cas doesn't actually _sleep_," he explained tensely. Sam nearly choked on his breakfast burrito.

"Whoa, man, too much information! You think I want to hear about that?" Sam asked, disgusted, his mind immediately jumping to all the wrong conclusions. It wasn't that he didn't approve of his brother's relationship with the angel, he had in fact, been one of their earliest supporters. It was more that he didn't want the gory details of their life together, especially this early in the morning.

Dean glared at his brother.

"Get your mind out of the gutter, Sammy. I wasn't talking about _that_," Sam's face cleared slightly but it was already too late. "It's just… do you have any idea how hard it is to fall asleep when you've got an angel staring at you?"

"Uh…" Sam responded awkwardly, "I really, _really_, wish I could say 'no,' but there was that one time Cas decided to stay in our motel room with us all night," Sam cringed at the memory.

"Yeah, imagine that, like, times _ten_," Dean complained.

"Well, you guys don't live in a box, right? There's gotta be some way he can entertain himself."

Dean actually laughed at that.

"I tried, Sam, I tried," he said. "Trust me, it didn't work out."

_"Dammit, Cas," Dean muttered, trying and failing to avoid the angel's piercing gaze by not looking. "I can't sleep when you look at me like that."_

_"What do you suggest I _do_, Dean?" Castiel asked innocently. He honestly didn't know how to handle the situation. _

_For some reason that only irritated the exhausted Dean further. _

_"The hell should I know? Go find some way to entertain yourself," he muttered. _

_Castiel titled his head quizzically before disappearing from the room. Dean groaned and rolled over onto his side. Peace. Finally. Maybe now he could finally get some sleep. _

_Apparently not. _

_For fifteen minutes Dean tried to drown out the sound of what he recognized in the back of his mind as a rerun of _Dr. Sexy, MD._ He even went so far as to slam his pillow over his head. Nothing worked. _

_"Cas," he called out, "can you please turn that down?"_

_Castiel apparently didn't hear him, because there was no change. _

_"Ugghnnn," Dean groaned helplessly, dragging himself out of bed with great effort. He stumbled into the living room. _

_"Cas…" Dean paused, still half-asleep. He succeeded, however, in getting his angel's attention. _

_"Dean! I was under the impression that you were sleeping."_

_"Was. Trying. The noise… doesn't really help," Dean explained. _

_"Oh," Cas said quietly. He looked down apologetically and turned off the TV. "Better?"_

_"Sure, thanks," Dean mumbled, his ears grateful for the sudden silence. _

_"I apologize for disrupting your rest. I was only trying to 'entertain myself,'" Cas spoke, god bless him, with actual airquotes. _

_"Yeah, I know. It's fine, Cas, really, just, find a quieter way to do it, okay?" _

_Cas nodded grimly as Dean lurched back into the bedroom, collapsing as soon as he within reach of his bed. _

_Cas stood in the living room thinking. What else did Dean do for entertainment? He listened to those five tapes of his… _

_Just after pressing 'play' Cas realized that music was just as loud as television and quickly shut it off. _

_What else did Dean do when he was bored? He ate, often he drank, Cas concluded. Neither of these were things an angel _needed_ to do, but even humans often participated in them purely for pleasure. _

_Cas zapped himself to the kitchen. No matter how many times Dean told him he could just walk the damn ten feet he always forgot. _

_First, Cas tried the microwave. Dean was always putting frozen food in that box, wasn't he? Thinking ahead, he decided to see how the controls worked before he actually put anything in it. _

_Cas was horrified when the machine let out a series of loud beeps. He'd never realized it did that! Quickly, he pressed any button he could find, searching for a way to silence the beeping before he woke Dean. _

_The microwave quieted, Cas continued his search for something to do. _So much for food…_ he thought,_ what about drink?

_Beer… Dean liked to drink beer to relax, didn't he? Cas rummaged until he located the stash, pulling a single bottle from a shelf in the refrigerator. _

_Unfortunately, that simple action caused the surrounding five to tumble down around him and roll off the shelf. Before Cas realized what was happening it was too late to stop it. _

_Five bottles of beer crashed to the floor. Shards of glass and amber liquid flew in every direction. Castiel could only stare in shock and horror. And, to make matters worse, he forgot the beer in his hand and released his grip. And so the last of Dean's six-pack joined its siblings in a mess on the ground. _

_In an instant Dean, suddenly wide awake, was standing in the doorway. _

_"Cas! What happened? Are you okay?" he shouted, his levels of concern rising nearly to panic. _

_"What? Oh…" Cas turned his head slowly to face his boyfriend. "I, um, I hope you're not mad… it was an accident, really, I'm sorry!" Cas blubbered desperately. _

_Dean relaxed and his face softened. _

_"Ah, hell, Cas, it's just booze. I'll just have Sam buy me more, okay? It's not your fault. And I'm not mad, I was just worried about you." He smiled a little, and it felt right. If he wasn't so damn tired this would be pretty damn funny._

_"Come here," Dean whispered, and Cas obeyed, reappearing directly in front of Dean to avoid the mess. "Next time turn the light on, okay?" he asked, and Cas nodded his agreement. Dean kissed him gently. "Now, can you use your angel mojo to clean this up?"_

_Cas had not considered this. He'd cleaned up faces a thousand times at least—Winchesters had a tendency to get hurt—but never a kitchen. Finally Cas nodded. In an instant, the mess was gone.  
"Good." Dean smiled again, sleepily. Now that the adrenaline had worn off he was starting to remember that he hadn't actually gotten any sleep. _

_"Can't you just read a book or something?" _

_Slowly, Cas shook his head. _

_"I have all our books memorized," he said apologetically. Dean groaned inwardly, making a mental note to ask Bobby for a few loans to keep his angel busy. _

_"I'm sorry," Cas said, and he was, "it's just hard to find things to do around here without you." _

_That gave Dean an idea. _

_"Hey, Cas, you can enter dreams, right?"_

_Cas frowned. He'd rarely used that ability except to deliver messages, although he and Dean had had a few dream conversations early in their courtship._

_"Yes… so?" Cas began, but trailed off when he saw where Dean's line of thinking was headed. _

_"What I think you should do," Dean said, "is come back to the bedroom with me and hold your boyfriend until he falls asleep. Then we can hang out in dreamland for the rest of the night, okay?" _

_Cas smiled warmly. _

_"That sounds… nice, Dean," he said happily. Dean found the energy to smile back. _

_"Just so long as you don't Freddy Krueger me, buddy," he teased. _

_Cas tilted his head in his signature manner. _

_"I don't understand that reference…"_

"Wow, seriously, all your beer?" Sam asked, astounded.

"Yeah, Sammy, which is why you are going on a beer run tonight," Dean answered seriously.

"Me?" Sam complained. "Why do I have to… you know what? It's not even worth it," he muttered. If he tried arguing with Dean his brother's angelic boyfriend was sure to get involved, and Castiel's stare was surprisingly effective. Knowing he would lose in the end, there was no point in fighting it. "So what did you guys do all night in dreamland, anyway?"

Sam realized too late that he was going to regret asking that question.

Part of the time they had, in fact, just talked, but why tell Sam that when he could make him squirm. Besides, there was the rest of the night…

Dean grinned wickedly.

"That, Sammy, would be _too much information."_


End file.
